tthdrabbles | Drabble: Fade - Pg13

A/N: I didn't get this typed up in time for last week's drabble topic, but here it is anyway.

Title: Fade
Author: Jinni (druscilla@cox.net)
Rated: Pg13
Pairing: Dawn/Richie
Disclaimer: All things BtVS belong to Joss Whedon, et al. All things Highlander belong to Davis/Panzer, et al.
Distribution: The normal places.
Notes: For the tthdrabbles ‘character death’ topic.
Summary: She’d often wondered what would happen when the moment came.

“You knew this day would come.”

He looked so weary, sitting next to the bed. The hum of the machines that monitored her vitals was easily ignored after months spent in its company, yet now it seemed loud, distracting.

“Dawn –“

“Shhh,” she hushed, auburn hair long gone gray rustled against the thin white hospital pillow.

“I love you.”

“I know. I love you, too. For the last sixty years I’ve loved you – and I will still love you after I’m gone. Love. Never. Dies.”

He smiled, but the light didn’t reach his eyes. They’d known from the beginning that this day would come – her old and dying, him just as young as ever. Such was the price of being an Immortal.

“It’s not really death,” she whispered, stopping as a wave of pain passed through her. Nothing to be done for it now, and the room was getting dimmer. Her eyes shut slowly. “It’s a release for me. From energy I was born, and to energy I shall return.”

Death of her physical body was not a cessation of existence, she tried to say. But her tentative, failing grasp on reality had faded.

With a sigh, she let go.

~*~End Drabble~*~